Welcome to DR. STU'S BLOG. Along with my podcast at www.drstuspodcast.com it is here that I post my thoughts on a variety of topics on the birthing world. Advocacy for true informed consent and respect for individual autonomy are the basis for the musings you will read here. I hope you enjoy while you learn and I encourage you to comment. Please check out www.birthinginstincts.com for information on home birthing with an obstetrician and my latest news and updates.

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing" Edmund Burke, 18th century Philospher.

"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of it being right." Thomas Paine

"The welfare of humanity is always the alibi of tyrants." Albert Camus

"Choice is the essence of ethics: if there were no choice there would be no ethics, no good, no evil; good and evil have meaning only insofar as man is free to choose." Margaret Thatcher, March 14, 1977

“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” ― Upton Sinclair

Explaining the Cause

I am a practicing obstetrician who is a strong supporter of patients rights to informed consent and refusal. I believe a patient has the right to choose her own path given true and not skewed informed consent. Following that tenet, just as a woman should be able to choose to have an elective c/section she should be able to choose not to have one, as well. The American system of hospital based obstetric practice has been eroding those choices for women for quite some time. Due to concerns of economics, expediency and fears of litigation women are being coerced to make choices that may not be in their best interest.

I have had a long relationship collaborating with midwives and find the midwifery model of care to be evidenced based and successful. I was well trained at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in the mid 80's to perform breech deliveries, twin deliveries, operative vaginal deliveries and VBACs, and despite evidence supporting their continued value, hospitals are "banning" these options. Organized medicine is also doing its best to restrict the availability of access to midwives.

Home birthing is not for everyone but informed choice is. Medical ethics dictates that doctors have a responsibility and a fiduciary duty to their patients to provide true, not skewed, informed consent and to respect patient autonomy in decision making. Countries with the best outcomes in birthing have collaboration between doctors and midwives. This is not what has been happening in the hospitals of America. Its time for a change and the return of common sense.

The midwifery model of care supports pregnancy as a normal function of the female body and gives a legitimate and reasonable alternative to the over-medicalized model of birth that dominates our culture. Through this blog I hope to do my part to illuminate what is wrong with our maternity care system and what is right with it. I do not expect all to agree and that is OK. We must all understand that given honest data it is not always reasonable to expect two people to come to the same conclusion. Our differences should be respected.

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Check out this video by Kirsti Kreutzer!! Stay informed on what is happening around the country by viewing this 12 minute film from North Carolina. See if this story sounds familiar in your area. Support midwifery and never believe that a small voice can't change things. Dr. F

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Hi All, have been off the radar for a few weeks as some important issues sort themselves out. For now I must remain silent but hopeful that things will be improving for women's birth choices in my community. Your voices have helped and there is no reason to stop now. I speak out when injustice appears in the birthing world and there has been plenty to talk about but now there are some voices of reason appearing and lets see where this goes.

In the really good news arena, the second edition of "Fearless Pregnancy" is now available on line as a book or a download. You can find it at

http://www.lulu.com/content/8624827

and soon it will be linked directly from our website at www.fearlesspregnancy.com as well. It continues to remind women that pregnancy is not a disease state and does not need to be treated as an illness in almost all cases. We have added some updates in new technologies, ideas and evidenced based approaches that are confirming what many of us knew as truth before. The book still has the easy reading wisdom it had in the first edition. It would make a great gift for loved ones who are pregnant or contemplating pregnancy soon as it would help them have a calm enjoyable voyage through one of life's greatest moments. Dr. F

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Many Voices!

Dear friends, You must know by now that one third of all women in this country are now delivering their babies by cesarean section. This is an amazing statistic when compared to the rest of the world and has to imply that many women are being deprived of choice and having unnecessary surgery often without their full informed consent. I have a teenage daughter. What will the future hold for her and all the future mothers in our country? The current obstetric environment does not bode well for these women and we have yet to experience the full knowledge of the physical and emotional damage being done by all these surgical births. For our beloved daughters and for the sake of all our future mothers the time to stand down is over. Make your voices heard. Thank you so much, Dr. Stu